It’s only been a year since the Draft, but it’s been bad for pretty much all of the early Orioles picks.
If early results hold for the 2024 Orioles Draft class, it is shaping up to be the worst one of Mike Elias’s tenure as general manager to date. Saying that everyone sucks would be an exaggeration, but not that much of one. The top three picks all are performing like absolute duds to this point in their pro careers. Almost no one is doing well. The good news is that it’s only been a year and things can change. For most of these guys, things need to change.
There are a few things that are distinct about this Draft for the Orioles. The first round pick at #22 overall was the lowest top pick that they have made in the Elias era. That’s what you get when you make it to the Division Series round. The Orioles used more picks on high school players than they’ve done lately. What’s more, they signed everybody, which they had not done in any of the previous 20-round Drafts. This included modest overslot bonuses to two different Day 3 picks.
One thing that means about this class is that there are some more potential longer-term plays than, say, the 2023 group that I wrote about yesterday. The Orioles did not sign any high school players in that class. Those players will probably either look like big leaguers or busts by this time next year. It’s good to have the high schoolers in the 2024 class because, as I’m about to get into, the college crop of draftees is not doing good things.
Vance Honeycutt
The top line on Orioles first rounder Vance Honeycutt is that he strikes out a comical amount. I’m talking 119 strikeouts in 69 games played. He’s struck out in over 40% of his plate appearances with High-A Aberdeen this season. No one can achieve success at that kind of rate, and Honeycutt certainly isn’t – though, with a 14.5% walk rate and 22 steals, he’s trying to do it.
Here is one sentence from a few pre-Draft scouting reports about Honeycutt, who was coming out of the University of North Carolina. See if you can spot a pattern:
- FanGraphs: Honeycutt is a power/speed center field prospect with hit tool risk.
- MLB Pipeline: Honeycutt comes with at least plus tools across the board with one notable exception: his bat.
- Baseball America: The fact that a 6-foot-3, 205-pound center fielder with his physical tools … isn’t viewed at the very top of the class speaks to the questions present in his offensive profile.
The dedicated Elias haters view the brutal early results for Honeycutt as evidence that Elias has a bad plan or doesn’t know what he’s doing. I think Elias knew that this was a risk, just that it was a risk that was worth taking at #22, when you’re not guaranteed to get a star. Going back to 1965, just 17 players taken 22nd have accumulated 5+ career WAR. Honeycutt hit 28 homers for the Tar Heels as a college junior. Yeah, that’s college competition with different bats, but there was real power potential there, and everyone agreed on the speed/defense combination as well.
Some publications liked this player: Pipeline had him 22nd, exactly where the Orioles took him. Baseball America put Honeycutt even higher at 13th. Others who were more skeptical about the hit tool had him as more of a second round talent. The Orioles lined up more with the optimists in making this pick, but they weren’t out on a weird limb in taking this chance. That said, it was definitely a chance and at this point it looks like a big swing and a miss, the kind of thing in which Honeycutt himself specializes.
If recent mock drafts are to be believed, the Orioles are perfectly willing to try again on a similar player in 2025, Texas A&M outfielder Jace LaViolette. The failure with Honeycutt does not make LaViolette any more of a risk, but it would sure look bad if the O’s blew two consecutive first rounders who failed for similar reasons.
University of Virginia teammates
The Orioles stayed in the Atlantic Coast Conference with their next two picks, taking two players from the University of Virginia. Shortstop Griff O’Ferrall went 32nd overall, with catcher/first baseman Ethan Anderson going 61st.
On the MLB Network broadcast immediately after the Orioles selected O’Ferrall, they proclaimed that the Orioles had gotten “the best defensive shortstop in college baseball this year … you’re getting the glove and you’re hoping the bat comes.”
To date, the bat hasn’t come. O’Ferrall is batting .208/.301/.299. Like Honeycutt, he’s stolen 22 bases, but what are you supposed to do with that kind of offensive profile? Keep working at it and hope that things get better, I suppose. They probably won’t.
Similar to Honeycutt, there were writers who liked O’Ferrall in this range: Law had him rated 32nd, just where the Orioles took him, while MLB Pipeline put him 38th. Publications that didn’t think the bat could do it at all had him much lower. If the Orioles thought they were making a safe pick after taking the risk on Honeycutt, well, the safety hasn’t bought them anything either.
Is there anything better to say about Anderson? No! He’s hitting even worse with the IronBirds, rocking a .214/.285/.298 batting line. Whatever the Orioles judged in either the natural talent of these two players or in the organization’s ability to make developmental adjustments to turn them into productive pro players, they have not seen any of it pay off yet. Like O’Ferrall, Anderson had some writers who thought his talent was roughly where the Orioles drafted him (late second round) while there were also non-believers who put him as more of a third round player.
Nate George
If your reaction to the above name is, “Who?” that’s okay, for today. This is your final excuse to not know about Nate George. After this, you will be chided, mocked, or ridiculed for not having gotten in on the ground floor. The Orioles used a 16th round pick on George, an outfielder from the Illinois high school ranks. He received an overslot bonus of $455,000 – counting about $300k against the bonus pool; Day 3 picks can sign for up to $150,000 before the bonuses count against the pool.
George did not arrive on the scene in any kind of organized game until this season. The Orioles started him off at the rookie-level Florida Complex League, exactly where you’d expect a late-drafted high school player to go. George blasted through the FCL competition, rocking a .383/.451/.556 batting line through 23 games. The team promoted him up to Low-A to see how he’d handle full-season competition. At Delmarva, George is still rolling: .337/.385/.528 in 22 games. He’s stolen 28 bases between the two levels.
It’s a long way to go from Delmarva to the major league level. There will be more challenges along the way for George. He’s an exciting prospect right now because this is the kind of early success story that the Orioles haven’t really had under Elias: A player taken in a double digit round who almost immediately starts looking like the O’s found a possible gem who wasn’t getting a whole lot of pre-draft attention. He’s also exciting because all of the early-round college picks presently look like they will amount to squadoosh.
Quick hits on some other guys
Third-rounder Austin Overn, an outfielder from Southern California, has the least-bad Aberdeen batting line of the high picks, OPSing .685 in 67 games. That’s actually slightly above average for a South Atlantic League player; it’s a bad league for offense. He’ll likely earn a promotion to Double-A with that kind of performance, at which he’ll hopefully be able to show further development.
Fourth-rounder Chase Allsup, the highest-drafted Orioles pitcher in this class, has a 6.32 ERA through 16 starts; he’s walked 46 batters in 62.2 innings.
Sixth-rounder DJ Layton received an overslot bonus ($715,800) as a high schooler out of South Carolina. The shortstop is still at the FCL level, where he’s batted .203/.379/.257.
Eleventh-rounder Sebastian Gongora has struck out 59 batters in 41.1 innings between Delmarva and Aberdeen. He was recently placed on the injured list.
Twelfth-rounder Andrew Tess, a catcher from a Florida high school, also received an overslot bonus ($347,500). He’s hitting .240/.460/.323 through 39 games for the FCL Orioles.
**
It’s bad that the Orioles used their first six picks on college players who are ostensibly more advanced and should move faster, and the results from those players after a year are five guys who are currently tracking as flops and a sixth guy who is sort of maybe okay, if you squint.
It’s bad that another Draft class has come and gone with no pitchers who are worth talking about very much. Elias has not used his early draft pick capital on pitchers and that is one reason why no Elias-drafted pitcher has ever started a game for the Orioles, with no one looking in imminent danger of breaking that streak. Any of these things could change. Player development is not linear, and there can be surprises. For now, they are where they are.
It’s good that Nate George is fun. I hope he doesn’t fall back down to earth now that people are starting to notice him.